In a larger vehicle, particularly a passenger aircraft, emergency equipment items for on-board passengers such as, for example, life vests are carried along for use in an unfortunate event such as capsizing, emergency landings, emergency water landings, or the like. Life vests are predominantly stored in open storage compartments underneath passenger seats such that they may be easily taken hold of by passengers seated in the passenger seats in case of need.
Due to approval regulations, it must be ensured that a life vest is situated underneath each passenger seat of a commercial aircraft before each flight. This is realized in the form of a visual inspection by a flight attendant before the passengers enter the cabin of the aircraft. Due to the concealed placement of the life vests underneath the passenger seats, this is a laborious and time-consuming procedure because it is necessary to look and/or feel underneath each passenger seat.
If life vests are stowed underneath the passenger seats, one commonly encountered problem is that passengers occasionally remove life vests unnoticeably and carry them out of the cabin of the aircraft. Due to the inferior visibility, it is hardly possible to monitor all storage compartments underneath the passenger seats for the purpose of theft prevention.
One solution in this respect could be the utilization of special seat cushions that may also be used as life vests. In this case, the seat cushion needs to be removed from the respective seat and carried along to an emergency exit. However, this may not be considered as an ideal permanent solution, but rather merely a particularly cost-efficient remedy.
Another solution to this problem could be the arrangement of a receptacle that may be closed with a lid above each passenger seat as described in DE 3 604 857 C1, where the receptacle contains a packsack with a life vest and may be opened by the passenger in case of need. In case of a panic, this may not necessarily be a smooth procedure because the passengers could possibly be unable to open the receptacle and remove the life vest due to a loss of self-control.
Another problem of the aforementioned solution may be that, in order to ensure sufficient accessibility, the receptacles above the passenger seats would also have to be shifted in fast reconfigurable cabins, in which the passenger seats may be shifted from one mounting point to another mounting point.
At least one object of the invention may therefore be seen in proposing a device for storing emergency equipment items, in which it may be ensured that a life vest or the like is presented to each passenger within a reconfigurable cabin such that it may be accessed easily and preferably without requiring excessive self control on the part of the passengers. Likewise, a sufficient protection against theft needs to be ensured in order to prevent the unnoticed removal of life vests or other emergency equipment items. In addition, other objects, desirable features, and characteristics, will become apparent from the subsequent summary and detailed description, and the appended claims, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and this background.